Is a law against chewing or possessing gum ABSURD?

I’ve been to Singapore around a dozen times and I have carried chewing gum with me every time. I’m a gum addict I suppose… but I’m also a responsible adult and I never put finished gum anywhere but a trash bin. The Island Nation of Singapore is known widely because of its natural equatorial beauty, its harmonious multi-cultural environment, it’s alignment with western values in an eastern nation, and it’s sometimes ABSURD laws. In my humble opinion, the law that makes it illegal to import gum or to have it or use it is totally ABSURD.

Why can’t the government treat their citizens as responsible adults? The obvious implication is that citizens of Singapore cannot be trusted to act like responsible adults, that is why this baby law is on the books – and enforced.

It is interesting that the government relaxed the law slightly in order to enter into a Free Trade Agreement with the US which saved them hundreds of millions of dollars. They made it legal to chew medical gum as long as a Doctor or Dentist sold it and recorded the purchasers name and address info.

That is actually a step in the right direction but come on people, if you can’t trust your citizens to walk and chew gum at the same time that is a sad state of affairs.

Actions

Information

3 responses

nice one
thanx
& the greatest absurdity of all in it is that one even needs a state licensed md to say it is medically necessary or dentally warranted to own & chew this gum
hahaha

& that one could therefore not prescribe such a healthy procedure for oneself
hahahaha

or that one needs a doctors letter to be exempted from wearing an otherwise compulsory seat belt
in the land of the nominally free & the home of the nominally brave

etc etc

the state controlled church of medicine & safety goes unnoticed all the time in laws such as these

consider for example the implications of the widespread legal mandates for only properly medical hemp or coca etc
as distinct from illegal tho still highly effective self healing by means of such multiply beneficial medicinal plants

in reality these are not even a tyranny of the majority
for that would be absurd enough
but a tyranny only of special interests & the political class by & large

I have to agree with you Alethia. It appears to be Absurd. The ban in the first place is questionable. I personally would give the citizens the benefit of the doubt. But to lift the ban to satisfy Wrigley Gum manufacturing is worse.

whether we are talking about tyranny by special interests or by the political class or even only by the actual political majority
it is still tyranny
& thus absurd

to be not absurd
a law would uphold & protect rather than violate minority rights & individual rights

& it is also good to differentiate
everyone is ok if a gum lobby happens to agree everyone may chew gum
but not ok if a tobacco lobby is able to tyrannize some for smoking pot

but i would go further

just as states & nations are legally sovereign within their territories
& even up to 3 or 12 nautical miles beyond their seacoasts
so individuals should be understood to be sovereign within their bodies
& up to say 3 or 12 nautical inches beyond their skins

obviously this includes chewing gum whether in their mouths or pockets

similarly drugs & or medicines
which btw are one & the same thing anyway
only called by different names to distinguish the legal from the illegal